Block copolymers are an extremely versatile range of high quality non-ionic low-foaming surfactants of ethylene oxide and propylene oxide. The composition can be an PO block flanked by polyethylene oxide chain, generating two primary functional hydroxyls (Fig. 1); or a reversed structure, where a central EO block is sandwiched between a polypropylene glycol group, resulting in an overtone of secondary hydroxyl end groups (Fig .2).
The structure can be depicted as follows:
In chemical abstracts Diol EO/PO Block copolymers are described under the scientific name - Hydroxy-hydroxypoly(oxyethylene)poly(oxypropylene)-poly(oxyethylene) - block copolymer in combination with the CAS register number [9003-11-6].
